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BY JED JALECO DEL ROSARIO
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Sunday. September 17, 2017
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RECENTLY, US President Donald Trump tweeted, “North Korea has conducted a major nuclear test. Their words and actions continue to be very hostile and dangerous to the United States. North Korea is a rogue nation which has become a great threat and embarrassment to China, which is trying to help but with little success. South Korea is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!”
Now, the interesting part about this tweet is the reference to the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Trump is basically signaling to everybody that the PRC is no longer capable of controlling their de facto vassal state, North Korea, and that the situation is slowly spiraling out of control.
Now, there are two ways to plausibly interpret Trump’s tweet. On the one hand, there’s the theory that the North Koreans are carrying out their tests with China’s blessings.
If this is the case then North Korea’s tests may just be China’s way of thumbing its nose at the US, in which case that’s a good thing. If the Chinese are just using the North Koreans to make the US lose face in Asia, it means that the PRC is holding the DPRK’s (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) leash, and the tests are just for show.
The alternative explanation, though, is a little bit more frightening. Consider for a moment that North Korea’s tests don’t have China’s blessing, and if this is the case then it likely means that the North Koreans are carrying out the tests because it feels alone and isolated. Without powerful friends to protect them, they will likely escalate the development of their nuclear weapons capabilities, so as to further strengthen their position not only against the US and its allies, but also against China.
And if this is the case, then the situation in North-east Asia could heat up pretty fast.
The North Koreans never needed to develop their own nukes in the past. They have China and to a lesser extent Russia to protect them, and to a certain extent this is still the case.
And yet, despite the protection of their allies, the DPRK still sought to create their own nuclear capabilities, which seems to imply that they don’t trust either China or Russia to protect their interests.
What people need to understand about nukes is that they offer power. A nuclear-armed North Korea is not powerful enough to beat China in a straight up fight, but it is powerful enough to hurt any group or country that decides to attack it.
Any weapons that the North Koreans can turn against the US, they can just as easily turn against the PRC, and given their proximity, the PRC is a much bigger threat to the North Koreans than the Americans can be.
Seen from this perspective, the situation in North Korea is indeed as much China’s problem as everyone else. (jdr456@gmail.com/PN)
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